MARK TWAIN

said frequently, "Good, very good indeed" and at the
close, "I am very, very grateful."

After talking half an hour the Imperial party conducted
us all through the palace and then all through the young
crown prince's beautiful palace.

By this time it was after I, and an invitation came
from the Grand Duke Michael to visit his gardens, park
and palace and breakfast with him, which we did.

Prince Dalgorouki went along, and so did that jolly
Count Festetics who is to marry the Governor-General's
daughter. So also the Lord High Admiral of Russia and
a number of the nobility of both sexes connected with the
Emperor's household.

But the Grand Duke Michael is a rare brick!—and his
wife is one of the very pleasantest of all these pleasant
people, and both are sociable.

What happened in the park—and again in the court of
the palace, where the fountain was, and the flowers—and
above all the occurrence under the porch which has the
Caryatides in imitation of the Temple of Erechtheus at
Athens—these were rich—they must never be trusted to
treacherous paper—memory will do—I guess no one in
the world who could appreciate a joke would be likely to
forget them.

What really happened in the park was that
one of the Quaker City "pilgrims" said to the
Grand Duke, in a voice subdued in quality, but
not in carrying power,

"Say, Dook, whcrc's the water-closet?"
The "under the porch" joke was, as he con-
fessed years afterward, on himself. He had no-
ticed that a number of the foreign guests had a
bit of red ribbon in their buttonholes—an orna-
ment, as he supposed. He thought it attractive,
and discovering a bit of red ribbon—from a cigar,
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